Saturday, April 08, 2006

Alexander the Great Dork

A couple of weeks ago the Telegraph reported that Muslims were killing stray dogs in Turkey. Under the heading “Abusing dogs? Now they've gone too far!” I commented, “I bet more people in Britain get worked up about this than they do about threats to free expression”.

This was Guardian columnist Alexander Chancellor's response to the death threats and protests which followed in the wake of the Mohammed cartoons:

Take the recent London protest in which Muslim extremists called for the "beheading" of those who insult Islam. This, it was said, was incitement to murder, a crime calling out for criminal prosecution. But I couldn't really take it seriously, for beheading is one of the least practical forms of murder...

So I don't think we should worry too much. These periodic crises are characterised by a great deal of humbug on all sides.

When I visited Turkey last week on an inaugural London-to-Ankara flight, I decided the country was clearly ripe for membership of the European Union. Only a short walk from my hotel I found a Marks & Spencer, a McDonald's, a Body Shop and a Mothercare. I could have been in Milton Keynes.

But on the flight home next day, a stewardess gave me a copy of the Daily Telegraph that threatened to change my view. It contained a story from Ankara, the city I had just left, bearing the headline Muslims Accused of Killing "Unclean" Dogs. The report said a Turkish vet caring for stray animals had come across hundreds of dead dogs in a municipal dump. These were said to have been left there by city workers who liked to round up, torture and kill dogs because they believed them "unclean".

This made me wonder if Turkey really is ready to join Europe. True, its people seemed charming, intelligent and civilised; and its capital city could boast an M&S. But this was no way to treat a dog.

It’s nice of British Airways to take people like Chancellor on its new London-Ankara flights; it can’t be easy seating people with their heads up their arses.